Strings of Fate
by princessofthedeadsheep
Summary: You'd think that having strings to tell you who was going to be important in your life would help make life a lot easier. You'd be wrong. /Soulbonds of a more broad kind- friendship, family, and romance
1. Jeremy and Ulrich: the First Bond

**This was inspired by the series "Strung Along" on AO3 by brawltogethernow for the Detective Conan fandom, and I just had to try it out for Code Lyoko.**

When each person is born, it is with strings attached to their hands, invisible to everyone except those the strings connected to. A child will, for instance, have one connected to their mother and one to their father. At least, they should.

Ulrich Stern was a rare example of someone born without a string connected to one of their parents when both biological parents were still involved in his life. He had a string to his mother, but not one to his father. This, of course, was a closely guarded secret, as it would be downright shameful to admit that father and son did not have this connection so essential to their lives. Ulrich wondered if the string didn't show up because fate had known how his father would treat him. There was a theory he'd heard once, that abusive bonds refused to form as a protection mechanism. His mother and he were connected by a thin string that was a deep blue. Ulrich was certain the color had more to do with his mother's depression than with him. Not that he'd ever mention that.

Sometimes, Ulrich would wiggle his hands and stare at the strings that were just barely there. They were colorless until the connection formed, and until then could be seen in a way similar to that of a heat wave. Ulrich had his mother's string on the second to last finger of his right hand, just above where Eli's sat, only somewhat thicker. His housekeeper's was on his left index finger.

The pinky of his right hand had a string on it, just waiting to flare to life. It was already a wider string, he could tell, and he knew the pinky finger was often associated with love. Of course, there was a great deal of controversy about this, and it varied from country to country, but still. It was nice to know he had one.

Another string of around the same width sat on his second to last finger on his left hand, which made him want to groan half the time. That finger was often associated with rivalry, though it was usually of the friendly kind. Right now, his left and right middle fingers and right thumb were empty, as were the left thumb and pinky. There were two more on his right index finger.

So he had three out of seven so far. Given that he wasn't even twelve, that wasn't horrible. As people were born there would be more anyway. A string couldn't show up for a person who didn't even exist, after all. Ulrich had always been a more introverted person anyway, he didn't really mind. Plus, it wasn't like you weren't allowed to hang out with anyone else just because there wasn't a string there. People had actually created and destroyed strings before. It was rare, but it happened. Often, a 'superficial' string would appear upon the right thumb, a dull gray in color when people connected for short periods of time, perhaps as roommates or project partners, so long as they considered themselves 'connected' in enough of a way to create a string. If the connection persevered, a 'true' string was created on another finger. More often, the grey string would simply dissolve as the people moved on.

Ulrich had had five temporary strings, with kids at school and the kid who lived next door for a couple of years. He watched the last of the strings dissolve as he was driven to Kadic Academy for the first time. Sissi's string was perking up, and, he noticed, one on his right index finger grew conspicuously more active, as though it was being tugged. This was a sign that the person whom it connected to was nearby.

Every school allowed time for students to find their strings, because all schools were aware it was pointless to try and teach children when they wanted to know who the hell was connected to that string that keeps twitching. At Kadic, it was also used to determine room assignments. Who better to share your room with than someone fate had picked? As such, when they arrived at Kadic, most kids were milling around trying to find their strings.

Ulrich left his parents behind and walked quietly through the courtyard towards the cafeteria, then took a turn into the school building, following the string to a classroom. He found the boy, younger than most, he noted, with large glasses and short blond hair talking excitedly to a woman in a lab coat. He was moving around excitedly, which was probably why the string had been moving so much. As Ulrich stopped in the doorway, the string lit up like a firework, becoming sky blue. It drew the attention of the boy, making him stop talking mid-sentence to gape at his hand, then follow the string up to Ulrich, who simply held up his hand to show the string, eyebrow raised. The boy appeared unable to speak. The teacher chuckled.

"I see you've found a friend then. We can continue this talk later. Goodbye Jeremy." The boy just nodded, seemingly dazed. Ulrich walked into the room to allow the teacher to get out.

"You're- you're-" the boy waved the hand with the string on it as though trying to express something. Probably incredulousness.

"Ulrich Stern," Ulrich introduced himself, somewhat amused at the boy's antics.

"I- right- I'm Jeremy Belpois," Jeremy bounced on the balls of his feet. "It's nice to meet you!"

"You look young," Ulrich almost didn't think about the implication behind the words, but realized how tactless it was when the boy withered into himself, looking downtrodden.

"I skipped a grade?" he said it almost like a question. Ulrich just nodded.

"So I guess this means we're roommates."

"Actually..." Jeremy rubbed the back of his neck, looking embarrassed. "I'm supposed to get a single so that I can study... it's part of the deal my parents made." Ulrich couldn't help the grin that came to his face.

"We both get our own rooms? Even better. No offense, but I didn't actually want a roommate."

"That's fine," Jeremy said quickly, clearly wishing to please his new friend. "Unless you think that you'll be meeting anyone else today?" Jeremy cast a quick glance at his own hands, and Ulrich ventured a guess that none of his strings were moving either.

"No. You're the only string that's going to activate today," Ulrich shrugged. "Let's go."

"Okay!" Jeremy, very pleased, immediately agreed.

"I do hope you're going to assert yourself some," Ulrich commented as they entered the courtyard. "No way am I making all the decisions." Jeremy just smiled nervously before glancing down at his hand.

"My parents are coming," Jeremy said. "Do you want to meet them?" he asked nervously. Ulrich glanced at his own hand. His mother's string had barely flinched, meaning his parents had likely sat down somewhere and were probably talking, and not interested in where he was.

"Sure," Ulrich shrugged. Jeremy grinned, grabbed Ulrich's arm and dragged him where Ulrich presumed the strings were leading him.

"Jeremy!" a woman's voice called.

"Hey mom, dad!" he waved. "I've found one of my strings!" he said excitedly, waving Ulrich's hand along with his own as Jeremy's parents caught up to them. Ulrich merely shook his head in amusement. Kadic didn't seem like it would be too bad, at least.

SoFSoFSoFSoFSoF

Jeremy Belpois had been born with all of his strings already firmly attached, which was actually pretty rare. At least, everyone thought so. Usually, when a young child got another string, it was fairly obvious. The creation of a string caused a pulling sensation that thrilled some children and scared others, so usually children were very vocal about it. If nothing else, they usually played with the newest strings for a while after getting them (how this was possible was still under heavy debate, but the end of the strings could be touched if one wished to touch them). Jeremy had never shown any of the signs. When he was old enough, he cheerfully told his parents all about the little invisible strings that were on his fingers, As well as the two attached to them and the one attached to his grandfather.

His parents weren't concerned until Jeremy reached school age. When Jeremy had skipped a grade they had thought he would find at least one bond there, but this was not to be. Jeremy managed to be a successful loner, for the most part, only occasionally getting bullied, but he was very lonely. Not only was he younger, but he appeared to be the only one in his entire grade who didn't have at least one string hanging around. Not in the whole school did he find one of his bonds.

To make up for this, Jeremy obsessively studied the strings that decorated his fingers and searched to find everything this could mean. The internet was a godsend. He looked up every story he could on the strings and the bonds that formed them, read every scientific journal he could understand, even getting his parents to explain some before he was old enough to really understand the scientific speak.

Jeremy knew a lot about the so called 'Strings of Fate' also called the ribbons of affection/love, tails of knowledge, soul mate detectors, lines of connection, bonds of fate, and so many other things. They were on nearly everyone, with very few exceptions. In fact, people with no strings used to be considered demons, and had been sacrificed in many societies. Recent studies had discovered this was one of the signs of a sociopath or extreme mental disorders.

Despite the extensive studying, there was little actually known about them, though it was believed to be a psychic phenomenon of some sort- being connected to the brain, which allowed for the brain chemistry to be created, etc.- but that answered very little. There was a reason that many societies had lived, breathed and died by the strings attached to their fingers.

Jeremy had three attached to his 'familial' finger. These were the only three that had activated at all. He had another string on his lucky finger which was the left hand finger nearest the pinky. The only fingers with strings on his right hand were his index finger, which had two, and his pinky, where there was a lovely thick string that had been so still he could barely believe the person was alive.

That wasn't to say the other strings were very active, but there were twinges that people had found correlated with incidents in the life of the other. He was pretty certain that all his other strings had felt how horrible the last day of his second week of school had been, the day he had been moved up a grade and he had been bullied badly. His parents had picked him up immediately after school, his grandfather even visited, having felt the twinges across the strings. He too, had felt twinges ache across his strings, as well as excited bounces that portrayed a positive change. These incidents couldn't be subtle, they had to have a huge emotional impact in order to resonate. This occurred most often in young childhood, and sometimes was used to age the strings that one couldn't actually know the age of otherwise.

The only one that had never moved was the one that he often wished would move the most. The pinky, specifically but not exclusively the right pinky in men and the left pinky in women, was believed to be associated with romantic love. This was not guaranteed, but it was found that most heterosexual couples reported that these were the fingers that they ended up, which was why they were also the most popular ring finger across most countries. His ring finger only told him they were alive, because the string wouldn't be there if they died. That was his only answer.

When his parents told him they thought he should go to Kadic, he eagerly agreed, hopeful he would find one of his strings. Still, by that time, he really had given up hope on finding any of them. He'd spent many a time staring at them, thinking they were moving. When he finally felt a string moving, he simply didn't believe it. He ignored it.

Instead, he went looking around the school, and found the science teacher, Mrs. Hertz, who eagerly talked to him about the science they would be learning. It was so exciting he barely noticed the movement in his string...

...Until it burst to life. Jeremy didn't believe it for a minute. He stopped talking entirely, mind frozen as he looked at the string now full of color.

The string, a lovely sky blue, connected him to a boy who was probably a whole year older than him. The boy raised his eyebrow at him, holding up his hand to show where the string connected. Jeremy couldn't deny that he had freaking dreamed of this moment, and it hadn't been anything like this. Mrs. Hertz said something he didn't catch, and Jeremy just stared at the string and then at the boy as he moved closer.

"You're- you're-" he wanted to express his happiness at finally finding one of the people he was connected to, but he couldn't find the words.

"Ulrich Stern," the boy appeared to be amused by his stutters.

"I- right- I'm Jeremy Belpois," he finally introduced himself. Now that the shock was wearing off, he couldn't control his excitement. "It's nice to meet you."

"You look young," Jeremy couldn't stop his reaction. Of course Ulrich wouldn't want to be saddled with some kid younger than him as one of his strings.

"I skipped a grade?" he didn't want his newest bond to fail because of his age. Ulrich only nodded.

"So I guess this means we're roommates."

"Actually..." Jeremy rubbed the back of his neck, hoping that Ulrich hadn't been looking forward to sharing a room. "I'm supposed to get a single so that I can study... it's part of the deal my parents made." He was relieved to see the grin on Ulrich's face.

"We both get our own rooms? Even better. No offense, but I didn't actually want a roommate."

"That's fine," Jeremy said quickly, glad that they were both happy. "Unless you think that you'll be meeting anyone else today?" Jeremy cast a quick glance at his own hands, where none of his other invisible strings had so much as twitched.

"No. You're the only string that's going to activate today," Ulrich shrugged. "Let's go."

"Okay!" Jeremy, very pleased, immediately agreed.

"I do hope you're going to assert yourself some," Ulrich commented as they entered the courtyard. "No way am I making all the decisions." Jeremy knew they'd settle into a routine and he'd probably actually get a bit bossy. He felt a tugging on his hand and glanced down to see that his parents' strings were activating.

"My parents are coming," he said. "Do you want to meet them?" Jeremy asked nervously. Ulrich glanced at his own hand, then shrugged.

"Sure," he said. Jeremy grinned, grabbed Ulrich's arm and dragged him towards his parents.

"Jeremy!" his mother called.

"Hey mom, dad!" he waved. "I've found one of my strings!" he said excitedly, waving Ulrich's hand along with his own. Jeremy honestly didn't think he'd ever been happier. Several other people were feeling the warmth of his joy bubbling across their strings, as well as the more sedate relief that Ulrich was experiencing.

**Since I know you'll probably want to know:**  
><strong>Ulrich and his mother: Prussian Blue<strong>  
><strong>Ulrich and his housekeeper: Forest Green<strong>  
><strong>Ulrich and SissiEli: Champagne Pink**  
><strong>Jeremy and his mother: Dark Moss Green<strong>  
><strong>Jeremy and his father: Flame Red<strong>  
><strong>Jeremy and his grandfather: Dodger Blue<strong>


	2. Learning Curve

**Shorter chapter, but I wanted to post the next bit. I wouldn't expect updates like this all the time though. In fact, please don't you'll be very disappointed.**

Ulrich didn't seem anything like what Jeremy had imagined any of his strings would be like. Ulrich was mostly quiet, he was also often very rude (though Jeremy was not much better at times). As they grew more comfortable with each other, Ulrich did come around some. They were different- french fries and ice cream different- and at first, it was difficult to find common ground. Soon though, they found themselves settling comfortably into the relationship that fate had probably intended.

They often partnered in classes, though they didn't always sit next to each other, in which case they both sat alone. Sometimes though, Sissi took this to mean she could bother Ulrich, who had long out grown putting up with her more angering tendencies, the pink string on their fingers shrinking as a result.

Jeremy actually really liked being friends with Ulrich. He didn't mind giving Jeremy space, but he also took the time to ensure that Jeremy was taking care of himself, something Jeremy would often forget when he got caught up in something. He didn't anger all that easily, though he was sensitive about his grades, which Jeremy had found out only a little while after they met.

"What did you get on the French test?" he'd asked him one day. Ulrich had shrugged and muttered something, not looking at Jeremy. Jeremy had already been bracing for some bad news- Ulrich's string was twitching all over with something like failure- and he wasn't super surprised that Ulrich looked as bad as the bond felt. Jeremy was about to push further when he remembered what his mother had said after being introduced to Ulrich.

"Remember sweetie, a lot of people aren't as good in school as you are. A lot of times you may succeed where they won't, and if you aren't careful, that'll make them resent you. Don't push them to tell you about their grades, that's personal. Offer help where you can, but don't try to force it. Don't bring up grades all the time, it can make people be anxious. Just be courteous and aware of other people's feelings. If you got a horrible grade, you probably wouldn't really want to talk about it either, would you?"

So for the moment, Jeremy let it go, though he worried over his only friend for the rest of the day, something Ulrich definitely noticed. Still, they said nothing until the end of the day, when Jeremy went to Ulrich's room nervously, knocking with the hope Ulrich would actually let him in. He did, looking reluctant.

"What did you get on the French test?" Jeremy asked once he was in Ulrich's room.

"It's not important," Ulrich muttered, waving his hand as though to dismiss the subject, sitting on his bed and not looking at Jeremy. Unfortunately for him, Jeremy was stubborn.

"It is if you really don't want to talk about it," Jeremy insisted. "It's okay if you got a bad grade." He tried to soothe.

"No it isn't!" Ulrich hissed it out, letting his feelings boil over. "I'll never hear the end of it." Ulrich ran a hand through his hair. "I failed it, okay? I failed the test." He yanked it out of his bag and threw it at Jeremy, though it only fluttered to the floor. Jeremy picked it up and examined it. There was a moment of silence in which Ulrich rested his head in his hands and Jeremy read before Jeremy finally realized what was wrong.

"Have you ever been tested for Dyslexia?" he asked suddenly, and realized that this definitely was the wrong thing to blurt out when Ulrich was so stressed as he was given a scolding look.

"There's nothing wrong with me," Ulrich said angrily.

"Of course not!" Jeremy hastened to reply. "It would just mean you learn a little differently than the teachers teach, that's all. And, well..." Jeremy waved the paper. "It would explain some of the mistakes you made. It isn't your fault, really." Ulrich shook his head.

"Yeah, alright?" he muttered, pushing his hair out of the way. "I wasn't tested for dyslexia, per say, but I was tested to see why my grades were so bad. My dad got angry and says I just have to work hard. He was angry we couldn't cure it."

"It doesn't work like that," Jeremy said, confused. Ulrich snorted. He looked really uncomfortable.

"Look, I only told you because of..." Ulrich waved his hand where the string of their bond was. "Just... don't mention it, okay?" he looked at Jeremy and there was something in his eyes that made Jeremy feel... equally uncomfortable.

"I won't, I promise. I can help though. Read through stuff before you turn it in at least." Jeremy shifted, uncertain.

"I'd appreciate that," Ulrich muttered. "Can we just..." he made a vague gesture.

"Yeah, do you want to play that one game you were talking about before?"

"Yeah," They didn't talk about it again, nor about the fact that Jeremy suddenly started to deliver notes to Ulrich which had been typed with fonts more friendly to people with dyslexia, nor the fact that Jeremy read over all of Ulrich's homework and even some of his classwork, nor any of the other things Jeremy did to help Ulrich with their schoolwork. If, in exchange, Ulrich humored more of Jeremy's unintelligible babbling, well, no one knew the difference.

SoFSoFSoFSoFSoFSoF

"So you've done a lot of research on the strings of fate?" They were hanging out in Ulrich's room, not doing anything particularly interesting when Ulrich asked.

"Yeah," Jeremy said, "I wanted to know if I could find my people sooner." he admitted. Then he snorted. "You know, the bonds do that to us."

"Do what?"

"Make us say things we wouldn't tell anybody else. Though there is some controversy. Some people think it's the psychological element of the bond- you know it's someone you're supposed to trust so you tell them things you wouldn't be able to tell other people."

"Yeah, I get that." Ulrich held his hands above his head, studying the strings that decorated them. "Which finger is which? I know the ring fingers, the lucky finger and the family finger, but I don't remember what the other ones are."

"Well." Jeremy held up his own fingers, studying his own strings as he spoke. "Left to right, it's ring, lucky, networking, family and bad bonds. Then temporary, friend, cross-species, protection and ring."

"That... explains a thing or two, actually." Ulrich flexed his fingers, feeling the gentle strings as they moved. "Can we send thoughts across them? Like in the movies? I've tried it before but I never got the feeling they went through."

"It depends. Some people claim they can, and there has been evidence that it's possible, but only for some people. It's incredibly rare that you'd be able to do more than send extreme emotions across the bond. Success is also dependent on the state of the bond. I am able to sense your mood more easily now that our string has activated than I was able to before. I'm sure it's the same for you, as well."

"Yeah. It's weird, all these stories about bonds, and yet no one really seems to understand them."

"Everyone has their favorite theory. Mine is that it's who we are meant to meet as far as the future we have decided. I don't like the 'unchanging' theory, because I don't think time or fate is set the way some people do. What about you?"

Ulrich thought about it for a moment. "It's the people we would meet, no matter the circumstances, the bond just makes it easier to see who those people are, but it doesn't create the relationship. It just gives it a jumpstart." There was a moment of silence after this.

"That was a quote from a movie wasn't it?"

"It was a good movie."

"I'm sure it was."

SoFSoFSoFSoFSoF

"Ulrich, I don't understand why you're hanging around with that Belpois kid." Sissi had cornered Ulrich on his way to lunch. Between them, the bond shimmered, a sign of intense emotion.

"He's one of my strings, why else?" Ulrich shifted, his own annoyance becoming evident. "You know I'm not a social person Eli."

"It's Sissi!" she hissed, hunching her shoulders. "Besides, I'm one of your strings, and you barely talk to me anymore."

"Maybe it's because Sissi is an immature spoiled brat who insults everyone and thinks she's better than everyone else." Ulrich barely kept his voice down. Sissi jerked away, looking hurt, before anger flooded her face.

"See, you're so different and it's all that stupid Belpois' fault!"

"Do you hear how ridiculous you sound? This isn't about Jeremy. He hasn't done anything and you need to leave him alone. It's about the way you're acting! You were never like this before, and I can't stand it. You want to save our bond? Stop being such a... such a _bitch_." Ulrich felt bad for saying it, especially seeing the look on her face, but he was seriously done with this entire act that was Sissi. "Eli was one of my strings. I don't want to be attached to Sissi."

He left Sissi behind, crushed, and he didn't have to look at his hand to feel as the string on his finger moved, wrapping itself across his left thumb and turning the color of dead plants, as the emotional connection cut off, dulled beyond what he could feel. He pretended to be alright when he met Jeremy at their usual spot, and Jeremy pretended he didn't know something was wrong.

"So I've been thinking..." Jeremy started after a few moments of silence, looking unsure.

"Been thinking what?" Ulrich looked up at his friend with a raised eyebrow.

"Well... I need some spare parts for my robots, and I was thinking... there is that factory not too far from here..." Jeremy shrugged. "We could go there this afternoon and look around."

"That sounds like more fun than anything else I was planning to do this afternoon." Ulrich grinned. "Do you know how we're going to get there?" Jeremy nodded eagerly, and the boys got to planning their trip, making Ulrich forget about his fight with Sissi, which had been Jeremy's hope all along.

**I read a headcanon that Ulrich had dyslexia and it actually made a lot of sense with the show- he makes mistakes regarding words that are similar, he's really intelligent and yet still has trouble on tests, that sort of thing.**


	3. We're Not Normal, Are We?

**So here's the next part! I can honestly say, I have absolutely no idea where this is going. It might devolve into a more drabble like sense as we continue, but I do not know for sure.**

"I can't believe there is such an easy way to get to the factory from the school." Ulrich said as they climbed out of the sewer entrance.

"I know, it's weird, but good for our purposes. It goes further too, so we may be able to find other places on the grounds that we could enter through." Jeremy said.

"So more adventures then?" Ulrich grinned. "Sounds like we'll be having a lot of fun soon." Jeremy rolled his eyes but said nothing. They made their way to the factory, where Jeremy headed down the rope first. Ulrich, after a moment's hesitation, followed.

"That's a fancy elevator for a factory." Ulrich commented.

"It is." Jeremy frowned at it. "In fact... it's too new."

"What do you mean?"

"Just what I said." Jeremy pointed at the pulley system. "That's way too new compared to the rest of the factory."

"Well then, it must be hiding something interesting." Ulrich started to look unsure though. "Are you sure we'll be okay here Jeremy? It wouldn't do us any good to accidently infuriate some sort of underground cult or something."

"Oh please." Jeremy rolled his eyes. "I doubt it's anything that ridiculous. Besides, the dust alone shows there is no way anyone's been here in ages." he said, gesturing to the dusty footprints they'd been making. Jeremy studied the keypad under the elevator buttons, completely ignoring Ulrich, who watched with slight exasperation as Jeremy reprogrammed it. "I'm going down, coming with?"

"If I let you go alone you'd probably hurt yourself." Ulrich stepped into the elevator and Jeremy activated it, having it take him to the next available place.

"Whoa." Jeremy said as he looked in.

"What is all this stuff?" Ulrich stepped out more cautiously.

"It's some sort of computer system." Jeremy said in awe. "I've never seen one like this in real life."

"What makes you think it isn't just the base of operations for the factory?"

"Because that makes no sense. There would be no reason to need a system this big to run a factory, which would mostly revolve around machines being individual anyway." Jeremy studied the large screen in front of him. "Maybe we should turn it on. I'm sure the base is around here somewhere, maybe down a few floors..."

"No."

"But think of-"

"No." Ulrich sighed. "Jeremy, what good could come from turning on this computer?"

"Well we won't know until we turn it on, will we?" Jeremy secretly shared Ulrich's doubts, but the thrill of the knowledge he could acquire from this was pushing him toward turning it on. Jeremy looked at Ulrich with a steely glint in his eyes. Ulrich tried not to groan, because he knew that look. Of the few fights he'd ever really had with Jeremy, they'd all started because of that damn look. "We should turn it on. Who knows what we could discover? And when we're done, we'll turn it off."

"Jeremy this isn't a good idea."

"There won't be any harm in it," Jeremy said in an attempt to convince them both. "And it'll only be for a little while." Ulrich sighed.

"When you're done, you'll shut it off?"

"Absolutely," Jeremy said with an excited look. Ulrich huffed.

"Fine. But only if we check the rest of the place out first so we know we aren't turning on a weapon of mass destruction." Jeremy nodded, and they returned to the elevator. By the time they reached the last room, which Jeremy seemed certain was the actual computer, Ulrich didn't think he'd be able to stop Jeremy without tying him up.

"I hope we don't regret this in a minute," Jeremy said as he flipped the switch. To both Jeremy and Ulrich's surprise, only a moment after the computer flared to life, so did one of the strings on their hands.

"What the hell?" Ulrich said bluntly as the string on the same finger as Jeremy's settled into a bright pink color. Before he could really think, Jeremy was dragging him towards the elevator. As soon as they reached the floor where the computer chair and monitor were, Jeremy jumped out and sat on the chair, activating the screen. Ulrich stayed in the elevator staring at his hand, the string trailing downward to the computer's base.

"Hello?" Jeremy said hopefully as he accessed the computer. He felt his heart hit his throat as a pink haired girl popped up on the screen in front of him.

"Oh!" she seemed surprised. "Where am I? Who are you?"

"I'm Jeremy," he grinned, couldn't help it, as the string that had been dead for so long moved with light, a beautiful dark pink. "Who are you?"

"I... I don't know," she answered, looking confused. Jeremy didn't need the string on his finger to tell him he was in love. Her expression was freaking adorable.

"What's going on Jeremy?" Ulrich finally came up behind him, staring at the screen where the girl looked out.

"Who are you?" she asked, her voice so full of innocence it made Jeremy want to swoon.

"Jeremy," Ulrich said, his voice terse.

"Look, I don't know how or why, but I think the person we're connected to is her." Jeremy pointed towards the girl on the screen.

"She's a computer girl," Ulrich said, clearly skeptical. "She probably isn't even human."

"Her bond would be on a different finger if she wasn't," Jeremy fought back instantly. The look Ulrich threw him told Jeremy Ulrich had guessed what finger this bond was on for him. Jeremy blushed a bit, but set his jaw. Ulrich gave a heavy sigh.

"What are bonds?" the girl asked.

"Oh, on Earth," Jeremy started, immediately perking up, "We have bonds to people who are important to us. When we turned on the supercomputer, we each had one activate."

"Oh, I see. Is that the reason I feel this connection with the two of you? Almost like I know you?" she asked. Jeremy sent Ulrich a smug look, causing Ulrich to roll his eyes.

"That's precisely why."

"Alright, but that doesn't explain much of anything," Ulrich reminded him. "If she's human, why is she on a computer, of all things? What happened to her? How does this work?" he asked, waving his hand in the girl's direction at the last question.

"That's a pretty color. Is that one of the bonds you were talking about?" the girl asked. Ulrich froze.

"You can see it? Only the one string?" he asked. She nodded. "Then I suppose..." Ulrich grimaced, as though having to accept some sort of unpleasant fact. "...this must be our bond. We can only see the bonds that we're connected to."

"This is amazing!" Jeremy burst out, bouncing in the chair. "Ulrich, do you have any idea what this means?"

"I have a feeling you're going to tell me." Ulrich responded, clearly resigned to whatever fate had in store.

"This means that people can be put into computers! DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA HOW MANY SCIENTISTS WOULD KILL FOR THESE RESOURCES?" He gripped the collar of Ulrich's shirt and pulling his ear forward as he shouted in excitement, though he let go when Ulrich slid him a look.

"No, I don't," Ulrich said, rubbing his ear. "And I don't want to find out. Can you get her out of the computer?" he asked impatiently. "We shouldn't leave it on forever."

"I don't know," Jeremy admitted. "I haven't even looked at the system yet. I should do that."

"Please do."

"What's a scientist?" the girl asked as Jeremy turned back to the computer. She had been watching the two interact with curious silence. Jeremy launched into an explanation as he began to look through what he could see of the system.

Ten minutes later Jeremy was sitting back in the chair looking thoughtful.

"Well can you do it?" Ulrich asked impatiently.

"Right now? No. For some reason, she is treated like a computer program. There is no indication that she is human, but I can't think of a way that anyone would be able to make an artificial intelligence that could _bond_. At least, not automatically. That's just completely unbelievable."

"So you think I'm human?" the girl asked.

"Yes. What do you know?" he asked her.

"No more than you, unfortunately. I can't remember anything other than waking up," she shook her head. "I don't even know if I have a name."

"We'll think of one if we have to," Ulrich said. Jeremy sent him a surprised look. "What, you think I want to go around calling her computer girl or something? People will start thinking we're crazy."

"Good point. How about Maya?" he asked the girl.

"I like the sound of that." She seemed pleased. "That'll do."

"Great, so now that that's settled, what else do you know?" Ulrich asked Jeremy.

"Well, Maya appears to be inside of a tower on some sort of virtual world, though I have no idea what it looks like in a practical sense. I can get an overview, but that only tells me so much."

"Perhaps I should go explore," Maya said, looking around.

"Be careful," Jeremy told her. She shut down the visual as she moved towards what appeared to be the entrance of the tower. Carefully, she stepped out, and into a... forest.

"This place is amazing!" she gushed, looking around.

"Do you think you could send us a visual?" Jeremy's voice rang out eagerly.

"I can try." The image that popped on screen even impressed Ulrich.

"Bet that took a long time," he commented.

"That's absolutely amazing," Jeremy grinned. "Keep looking Maya." With that, the girl walked forward for a few more moments until she ran into a creature.

"There's something else here."

"Really? That could be-" Jeremy began, only to be cut off by Ulrich.

"Get away from it," Ulrich said sharply. "I've played enough video games to know how this ends." His warning came too late, however, and they heard Maya cry out and the computer started beeping.

"Head back to the tower Maya!" Jeremy cried out. A moment later she must have entered the tower, as the beeping stopped.

"Looks like a point based health system," Ulrich said looking at the screen.

"Interesting, the tower heals you Maya." Jeremy said, looking at the card that had popped up. "You should stay in there where it's safe, for now."

"We need to get going Jeremy," Ulrich said as he checked his phone for the time.

"You're right," Jeremy sighed, "but we'll come back." He told Maya. "Until then, maybe you'll find a way to interact with the system."

"I can certainly try," she agreed. "Goodbye Jeremy, goodbye Ulrich."

"Goodbye Maya," Jeremy said. Ulrich just waved his hand. "So was it worth the trip?" Jeremy asked Ulrich as they got in the elevator. Ulrich just snorted.

**I feel like Jeremy does a lot of internal squealing in the prequel that we never get to see because he had no reason to voice it. With Ulrich, there is finally a reason to make such excitement somewhat external.**


	4. The Circle is Complete

**Happy Holidays and Merry Christmas! I haven't had any time to write and it doesn't look like I'll have any time soon, so I was glad that I had this next part finished and on hand for the end of year festivities! Woo! I won't be skipping around with the point of views so much after this, it's mostly just a start up sort of thing. Things will also probably slow down a bit from here. So anyway, I hope everyone is doing alright, and enjoy the chapter.**

Odd Della Robbia came from a big family. He was the youngest of six, and the only boy. Because of this, it wasn't really all that uncommon that he didn't have bonds with all five of his sisters. The only bonds he had among his sisters were with his youngest sister, Adele, and one of his oldest sisters, Louise. All of his familial bonds were small. It was something he had come to accept long ago, that he wouldn't be really connected to any of his family. Even the sisters he had a bond with could barely stand him once he grew to a certain point. Because of this, his parents offer to send him off to boarding school excited him.

Odd was always one for adventure, and this town was so boring without anyone to share it with. Odd was certain he would find his place somewhere else, and if somewhere else was boarding school... well then, why not? At the very least, he'd get away from his sisters, who were a bunch of bullies when they weren't ignoring him anyway.

Five strings. Odd had five strings just waiting to spring to life. Frankly, he couldn't wait. He was tired of being alone around here, of barely connecting to the people around him. For some reason, fate hadn't deemed any of the people in the town fit for his bonding. Well, he hadn't either, so he couldn't really complain. Odd wanted _out_, because he was sick of _here_. Even though a part of him felt abandoned by the decision, he was sick of his life so excitement to get away managed to outweigh it.

He knew he'd made the right decision when he felt four of his strings tug as the plane got closer and closer to its destination. He felt even more excitement bubbling in his stomach as he leaned forward to whisper into his bag where Kiwi was wriggling away.

"We're going to find them, Kiwi. They're at Kadic. Pretty soon, we'll have more people to hang out with." The dog gave a tiny yip, which was thankfully small enough that he wasn't heard over the buzz of the airplane and the guy snoring in the seat ahead of him. Odd reached in and ran a hand down Kiwi's back, the string on his middle finger rippling between them, the color of a daffodil, which was wrapped around Kiwi's front paw. Why this was no one, least of all Odd, knew. But it didn't matter. Kiwi was his only real friend, and he didn't know what he'd do without him.

Kadic Academy was... pretty stuffy looking, actually. Considering the amount of money his parents were shelling out, he wasn't really surprised. Still, he didn't know what he was going to find here. Following the directions he'd been given and actually going to the office was a lot harder than he thought it would be what with all the strings tugging so insistently on his hands.

"Ah, so you must be one of the transfer students," the secretary said as he went into the office. Odd simply nodded. She smiled at him, and he remembered to give her a smile back. Despite his nerves, he was not some sort of a shrinking daisy. Not by a long shot. "Alright, Principal Delmas will see you in a minute. What's your name?" And so the mind numbingly boring part commenced. He was given a new kid speech and told he'd be given one of the three open rooms in the boy dorm, depending on if he bonded or not. There was one single room left, as well as two shared rooms that each currently had one occupant. This was by far more interesting to Odd than the school rules, though he paid enough attention to those to know which ones he'd probably break by the end of the week.

Finally he was led towards the classroom by the phys ed teacher, appropriately named Jim, where he would be taking classes, only to stop dead in the hall as he was blinded by not one but _two_ firework explosions before two different purple strings lit up on his fingers, one on his index finger and one on his lucky finger.

"Well," said one of the people he'd connected with, "that's one down." The one who spoke was tall, with brown hair and eyes. He was wearing a tan shirt with a pair of green pants and a matching jacket. The other was a blond haired boy wearing a blue shirt about two shades lighter than his eyes and khaki colored pants.

"So you're connected to these two huh?" Jim said. "Well, looks like you've got yourself a roommate, Stern, Della Robbia." The brown haired boy (probably Stern) groaned at that. The other looked apologetic. "Now you two make sure Mr. Della Robbia gets to all of his classes, you hear?"

"Yes Jim," the blond boy said. "We'll take care of it." He gestured Odd toward them and they all entered the science classroom. "You can sit with either me or Ulrich," he told Odd. "It doesn't really matter. I'm Jeremy Belpois by the way, who are you?"

"Odd Della Robbia," he said, sitting down next to the brown haired boy who snorted at his introduction.

"Odd huh? Never heard that name before," he said.

"It's Norwegian," Odd informed him with a shrug. "Ulrich right?"

"That'd be me," Ulrich grumbled.

"Don't you sound awfully pleased," Odd said sarcastically.

"Don't mind Ulrich, he's not so bad once you get to know him. He's probably annoyed that not only are you his roommate, but you're also his 'rival' if your string is anything to go by," Jeremy interrupted from behind them.

"Gee, thanks Jeremy. _So_ glad to be analyzed," Ulrich said. Jeremy just gave him an apologetic smile. Odd looked at their string and realized they were, in fact, connected by the lucky fingers on both sides, which, while not unusual was still very interesting. He had Jeremy's on his friend finger while Jeremy had his string on his lucky finger as well, he noted. And still there were two more strings waiting to be activated.

"Are you guys expecting to meet anyone else today?" he asked. It couldn't hurt to know.

"Yeah, actually. We have one more person left today," Jeremy said. "What about you?"

"Two more." Odd said. Jeremy looked surprised and Ulrich suspicious but they weren't able to continue talking as class began. Odd did find it interesting that across the bonds he felt Ulrich's apprehension and suspicion and Jeremy's excitement. Part of this was the newness of the bond making them oversensitive in close proximity, but Odd decided to focus on the feelings. It was Ulrich's reaction that really made him think. It appeared his new friends had a secret, and he wanted to know what it was.

SoFSoFSoFSoFSoFSoF

Yumi Ishiyama was not all upset to be moving. She wasn't like her brother- she had no friends at her old school, and she didn't particularly care one way or the other where they were living- but that didn't mean packing up and having to reassert herself somewhere else brought tears of excitement to her eyes or anything. Frankly, she didn't really care. Hiroki had been doing nothing but complaining over the fact he was leaving behind one of his strings- never mind the bond had been a created one rather than a born one- and he wouldn't let anyone in the family forget about it, to their annoyance.

Unlike her brother, who had sat around listening to stories about the strings of fate with fascination and impatience, Yumi had always been content with the mystery behind her strings. It wasn't that she never wanted to know who they'd be, she was just perfectly fine waiting. It might take six years, it might take sixty, and there was no use dwelling on it.

For the most part, this was true. Occasionally she'd get lonely and wish for one of her strings to activate, and she'd often wish she could comfort them when she felt pain of some sort go across her strings- which happened far more often than any type of pleasure- but that hardly meant she couldn't wait. Yumi knew that most of her strings were younger than her. She could even remember getting the last two strings, the bubbling joy as she watched the first string wind itself around her friend finger and later the second wrapping around her protection finger. Yumi was used to being the oldest, she was used to being responsible. She didn't always like it, but she had been raised to believe in the role she had been given, as an older child and a representative of a traditional Japanese family. She would do what was necessary.

When her strings began to react, she almost didn't believe it. She was fourteen and the only string that had ever activated was her little brother's when she was five. She had almost forgotten what it was like to feel someone coming who was meant to be. She flexed her fingers as she stared out the window, enjoying the feeling of the strings gently gliding and bumping into her hands. She didn't really notice that her mother and father had been casting looks at her as she felt all her inactivated strings just begging to come to life. She watched them almost entranced, ignoring her brother, ignoring the sights that flew by the window, ignoring what she was leaving behind in favor of the wonders ahead.

A few hours after they had gotten the basic needs settled, Yumi's parents insisted that she explore a bit. Hiroki was to stay and help her parents set up a few more things as punishment for all of his whining. While these things were both true, her parents also had a feeling that she was to meet her strings soon, which was considered a highly personal and private thing.

In Japan, it was traditional that anyone who experienced the activation of their strings in public would immediately be taken to a private room and left alone with a single guard outside the door- usually a family friend or, in higher status families, a trusted servant. There had often been parties with all children of an age to speak, spreading out within a room and finding their strings, an ancient practice that was still popular, especially in smaller areas. While it was considered highly private, it was still expected that family would be made aware of who was attached to their family members. As such, the Ishiyamas were hopeful that their daughter would prove they had raised her well by introducing her to her bond mates soon after being found.

So this is what led Yumi to taking the short walk towards her new school, though she wasn't entirely aware of this until she saw it. Students appeared to be leaving, and beyond the gate more students appeared to be milling around. The gate wasn't being monitored at the moment, and Yumi recalled that this was going to be her school, add to that her strings were getting really excited...

Yumi wandered through the gate, following the strings that encouraged her towards the forest that seemed to be around the campus.

"Jeremy, you can't know that he's trustworthy," an angry voice rang out as she entered the tree line. She listened closely, walking past the path that had been set.

"You can't know that he's not!" another voice argued, just as heated as the first had been.

"Could both of you stop talking like I'm not here?" a third voice, much higher than the other two, interrupted. "And am I the only one who's getting a lot of tugging on one of their strings?" Silence followed this question, and the sound Yumi's feet made as she walked became even more obvious as she continued to follow the strings. She heard someone else move and then a brown haired boy stuck his head out from behind a tree. The fireworks that lit up between them shocked Yumi, as well as the dark red string that brightened on her left pinky.

"Uh, hey," she muttered, wondering how exactly one was supposed to start a conversation with one of the most important people in your life. She didn't think any of the things she'd seen in movies really applied to this situation. This was especially true because the two of them had a blush filling their faces due to the fact they were connected _by the ring fingers_. The boy coughed before seeming to get a hold of himself.

"Hey. So um... you were looking for us?" he said, nervously. She nodded. She could hear other people moving and two blond heads peaked out, before another blast of fireworks appeared before her eyes. Two more strings lit up, one on her protection finger, connecting her to the blond boy with glasses, and another on the friend finger, connecting her to the blond with a spot of purple in his hair.

"Man, I'm going to go blind," the boy with purple in his hair exclaimed, rubbing his eyes.

"Actually," the other blond boy spoke, "You can't go blind from the experience of bonding. Bonding is an entirely psychic phenomenon and is not at all connected to your actual eyesight. In fact blind people have been known to report an experience of extreme sound rather than the 'fireworks' that we see. There is actually evidence that the fireworks are a socialized-"

"Jeremy," The brown haired boy cut off the other with a sigh.

"Ah, yes. Sorry about that," the boy held out his hand to Yumi. "Jeremy Belpois, by the way."

Yumi grasped his hand and shook it, the blue string folding between them. "Yumi Ishiyama," she introduced herself. The other blond boy immediately jumped into action.

"Odd Della Robbia, pleased to meet you." He grasped her hand almost as soon as she'd let go of Jeremy's, their dark purple string flapping as his hand moved. "And boy am I glad I'm not on your lucky finger. It was starting to get a little boring." Indeed, the two were connected on the friend finger. "Apparently these two have some sort of big secret and they were arguing about whether or not they should tell me. Well, now it would be us." He grinned at her, a huge smile that reminded her a bit of Hiroki when he was being particularly mischievous.

"We just met you today," the brown haired boy argued. "Just because we have a bond doesn't mean you're trustworthy immediately. We don't know anything about either of you!"

"Ulrich," Jeremy sighed. "I really think we're meant to show them. Odd even has a string that's supposed to activate, and I'm willing to bet Yumi does too." Jeremy turned to her with an eyebrow raised. She nodded.

"One more," she agreed. "It's tugging me away in this direction." She pointed past the boys to a point she couldn't have known had the entrance to the sewer. Jeremy turned to Ulrich with a look on his face they would all come to know as well as Ulrich had.

"Fine," Ulrich said after a few more moments of brooding silence. "But if this goes wrong-"

"It won't," Jeremy said confidently.


	5. This is Going to be Impossible

**Sorry this took so long! I was struggling with characterization and how far I really wanted to go and all kinds of not so fun things. It was a roller coaster... and not a fun one. Hopefully I'll be able to get more chapters soon. I'm also writing another part of this series I plan to post soon, as well as another story for code lyoko. That won't be a part of this series and will actually be a deconstruction fic. More on that later though.**

They made their way to the factory mostly in silence. Odd and Jeremy were walking ahead, Jeremy practically bouncing with excitement and Odd following with about as much enthusiasm. Yumi and Ulrich walked behind a little, and neither seemed really able speak, especially when their fingers brushed and they felt the string between them, reminding them of its existence. This only served to make them blush deeper.

"So um, you never told me your name," Yumi said once they had made it to the sewer entrance.

"Ah, it's Ulrich. Ulrich Stern," Ulrich muttered, his blush refusing to leave.

"Well, I'm pleased to meet you." Yumi gave him a smile even though she was still too embarrassed to meet his eyes.

"Uh yeah, same here." Ulrich managed to get out, even though he found himself blown away by her smile. She was very pretty, he couldn't help but notice. Still, Sissi had always been pretty, and that hadn't had an effect on how Ulrich felt about her. He sure hoped Yumi had more to her than being attractive. They walked in silence the rest of the way there, trying desperately to will their blushes away. Thankfully, it managed to work by the time they got to the factory.

"So this is your big secret? Looks... unimpressive." Odd said as he examined the outside of the factory. It was, admittedly, not much to look at. Merely a broken down factory in an island in the middle of the Seine. It looked more like an eyesore than any sort of a spectacular secret.

"It's the inside that has the impressive part. Now come on!" Jeremy rushed forward, the others following after him at a less hurried pace. Without thought he jumped onto the rope and slid down to the ground while the other three watched.

"Is that even safe?" Yumi asked with an eyebrow raised. Ulrich gave a shrug.

"Well, guess we'll find out!" Odd said, following Jeremy's lead he leaped onto one of the ropes, making it to the ground easily where Jeremy waited.

"What's the matter? Afraid of heights?" Jeremy called up to the other two.

"No, but I'm not about to leave someone up here on their own." Ulrich called back. He looked at Yumi, who was studying the rope as though she still didn't quite trust it. "So how about it? Are you going down?" Yumi seemed to debate this for another moment, before she finally let out a sigh, and grabbed one of the ropes. Ulrich grabbed the other one, the two reaching the bottom one right after the other. Jeremy, looking cheered, raced to the elevator and the others followed reluctantly.

"Now, be prepared, because this is pretty cool." Jeremy said excitedly, bouncing in place as the elevator doors slid shut. Ulrich rolled his eyes and Yumi and Odd observed them as they interacted. As Jeremy bounced, Ulrich watched him with resigned amusement, giving his arm a bump with his elbow that Jeremy seemed to take as some sort of signal, and he forced himself to be more outwardly calm. When the doors opened Jeremy didn't run this time, and only walked to the computer monitor, though he did so with an undeniable bounce in his step. As soon as he sat down, the other three appearing around the chair, the screen lit up.

"Good afternoon Jeremy, Ulrich." Maya spoke as she appeared on screen.

"Well hello there!" Odd said as he heard her greeting. "I'm Odd and I am delighted to meet a beauty like you!"

"Oh hello, and thank you!" Maya, oblivious to the flirting, responded. She looked over at Yumi. "And who are you?"

"Yumi," Yumi responded, frowning as she looked down at her hand. The string on it was going crazy, but it hadn't activated yet. When she voiced this, Jeremy looked surprised, before a thoughtful look crossed his face. Then, his face cleared as an obvious epiphany came to him. He grabbed Yumi's and Odd's hands, and shouted at Ulrich to keep Maya company.

"How are you doing Maya?" Ulrich asked after the elevator doors closed.

"I'm quite well. I've found out more about this place."

"Have you?" Ulrich turned more of his attention to her, ignoring the elevator he'd previously been eyeing from the corner of his vision.

"It's called Lyoko!" she told him cheerfully. "It has four sectors. An ice sector, a desert sector, a mountain sector, and a forest sector which is where I am. I don't know how to get to the other sectors yet though."

"I wonder if Jeremy will be able to figure it out."

"I'm sure- oh!" Maya exclaimed. "I can feel those other two now! The same way I feel you and Jeremy!"

"Really? I wonder what Jeremy did." Ulrich said, looking back towards the elevator which, coincidently enough, opened only a few seconds later.

"It worked. I knew it." Jeremy was babbling as he exited the elevator, Yumi and Odd following behind him looking surprised.

"I'm guessing you got their bonds to activate then?" Ulrich asked. Jeremy nodded vigorously.

"Maya isn't actually in the screen, she's in the computer. Bonds are activated by sight -usually at least- and our strings activated when we turned on the supercomputer, which is where Maya's soul is. It only makes sense they'd have to see the place that houses her soul for the bonds to activate. And it worked!" Jeremy hopped into the computer chair. "You can feel it too, can't you Maya?"

"I can," she smiled at them all very brightly. "I'm so pleased to see you all."

"Alright, now that Einstein over here has finished with his experiment, would anyone else care to tell us what in the world is going on?" Odd interrupted. "I, for one, am very confused about literally everything that's going on right now."

"Yeah, what exactly is one of our bonds doing in some sort of computer?" Yumi asked.

"Well... I have no idea." Jeremy admitted. "We found Maya when we came here to look for spare robot parts-"

"-when you came to look for spare robot parts while I came to make sure you didn't break your neck," Ulrich interrupted, giving Jeremy a smirk, to which Jeremy merely shot him an annoyed look before continuing.

"Ulrich noticed the elevator, and I noticed that it was way too new to be a part of the factory, so after convincing Ulrich to go down, we found this, and I wanted to turn on the computer, which we eventually did-"

"-After a lot of arguing-"

"-Stop interrupting! And we found Maya here, who is stuck in some sort of virtual world-"

"-It's called Lyoko!" Maya cheerfully interrupted Jeremy, and Jeremy did not scold her for doing so, much to Ulrich's annoyance.

"What did you say?" Jeremy asked Maya politely.

"I did some looking around and I found out this place is called Lyoko," she quickly explained (in more detail than she had to Ulrich) what she had discovered about the different sectors. "I still don't know why I'm here though. I haven't found any clues to my identity. Though I have found that there are more of those creatures, whatever they are, on each of the other sectors. They aren't even all like the one I saw! I don't know what's controlling them though. I tried to tap into their programming and I couldn't find it."

"That's most peculiar," Jeremy muttered as he started looking through some of the information Aelita had pulled up himself. "I'll have to look into more of the programming to see what I can find."

"You haven't done enough of that already?" Ulrich asked resignedly. Jeremy only gave him a look which Ulrich took to mean 'no definitely not, why would you think that?'

"I'm still confused," Odd interrupted.

"Well let me see if I got it," Yumi said, waving Odd off. "You two came here and found what appears to be a virtual world that has a human trapped on it, who has no memory of who she is, but that we all are connected to."

"Sounds right." Ulrich agreed.

"But why?" Odd asked, still somewhat baffled. "I mean, as cool as it is that there is a virtual world that you can put humans on- and don't get me wrong, that's awesome –why would anyone be left there? You turned on the computer, so that means that someone purposely left a human being inside of a machine and then turned it off. Which is both depressing and downright scary." There was an awkward silence as they digested this thought.

"I don't know," Jeremy finally said, "but I think we can all agree that we can't just leave Maya inside."

"No, I suppose not." Yumi agreed with a sigh.

"I've found the codes to send a person to Lyoko, even if I can't get Maya out," Jeremy gave them his version of a charming smile. "Anyone want to try it out?" there was about four seconds of absolute silence.

"Are you out of your mind Jeremy?" Ulrich asked conversationally, as though Jeremy had asked him if he wanted his brussel sprouts.

"I mean, it's the only way to check," Jeremy said reasonably. "Unless you can find me some sort of guinea pig."

"A guinea pig, huh?" Ulrich looked thoughtful for a moment, before the look on his face went positively mischievous. "I think I've got an idea."

"I don't think I'm going to like this idea," Odd said, having an inkling of what was going on. Before he could say anything else, Ulrich booked it into the elevator and was quickly followed by Odd, leaving Jeremy and Yumi behind.

"So... are you a student at Kadic?" Jeremy asked to fill the unexpected silence.

"Not yet. We just moved here, so I'll be joining the ninth grade tomorrow."

"Really? You're older than us then. We're all in the eighth grade."

Yumi frowned. "So that means I won't have any friends in any of my classes." She gave that thought for a solid second. "Ah well, not the worst thing to happen, and certainly not unexpected." She waved the idea away with her hand, much to Jeremy's clear amusement.

"What are these grades?" Maya asked them, drawing their attention back to the computer. This had the added advantage of giving Jeremy something to talk about to fill the silence while they waited for Ulrich and Odd, as Yumi was content to watch them in silence.

In truth she was contemplating all that she'd discovered in so short a time. She had a bond with a girl stuck in a computer, as well as three bonds with people who were at least a year younger than her. Odd seemed... silly, and she had a feeling he was more mischievous than he appeared to be at this moment. Ulrich appeared to be much more... relaxed? No, that wasn't the word. Shy, quiet. Yes, that was more like it. Neither he nor Jeremy appeared to be as boisterous as Odd. Jeremy seemed to be bossier though, and he certainly seemed to be rather smart if he was making robots and able to get the codes for the computer, as well as given the way he'd talked about the strings earlier. He and Ulrich were both stubborn from what she gathered about their argument. Maya was the simplest among all of them, considering she had no real memory. She appeared to be kind, curious, and innocent. Yumi didn't think that she'd be much more until she had time to create memories and learn a few things. They'd have to watch over her. Her thinking was interrupted by the sounds of the elevator turning on.

"Ulrich must have found his guinea pig." Jeremy said. Sure enough, Ulrich came back a moment later, from the side railing rather than the elevator.

"You can give it a try Jeremy," he said with a smug smile on his face.

"Alright," Jeremy, eager to continue, immediately began the process. Yumi turned to Ulrich.

"Exactly what did you put in the scanner?" she asked suspicious of the feelings of anger and fear on Odd's end and the smugness on Ulrich's.

"That mangy mutt that Odd sneaked into the dorms," he said, scowling at the thought. He scowled even harder when he received a swift smack upside the head. "Ow! What was that for?" he rubbed the back of his head.

"For being an insensitive jerk, that's what it's for!" Yumi was about to continue when Jeremy called out.

"We have a problem... Odd appears to have taken the place of whatever the guinea pig was! I can't stop the process!" they all felt it on their strings when there was a sudden burst of energy across the strings. For a moment, a single moment, it simply ceased to exist.


End file.
